5. Teogonía - Dr. Nico Gutierrez

[Aaron] Hello and welcome to the theorist composer collaboration a podcast interview series highlighting modern composers and their compositions,  hosted by music theorists. My name is Aaron D'Zurilla and I'm a graduate music theory student at Florida State University and I will be your host for today. The music that you were just listening to is an excerpt from a piece titled Teogonia, by the composer Dr. Nico Gutierrez who is the featured guest on this week's episode alongside his music. That leads me to welcome Dr. Gutierrez himself to the program. How are you?

[Nico] Hi, thanks for having me I'm doing great.

[Aaron] Very happy to have you here. Is it okay if I just call you Nico?

[Nico] Oh, yeah, totally.

[Aaron] Yes. Yes. Well, I want to respect the achievement that you recently had and we will be discussing that soon, but first, uh, tell the listeners about yourself personally, professionally, academically, whatever you choose.

[Nico] Yeah, I'm Nico. I'm a composer. I, my compositional career has kind of had lots of twists and turns. I do a lot of concert music, but I also do some music for film and media and I mean my whole journey here and getting the doctorate has been a nice time for like myself and like just growing focusing on my music a little more in finding like more of my compositional voice. Because, I, for a while, I was doing a lot of work that was very commission based or very based on on films and I had to hit certain things and it had to sound a certain way based on what directors wanted. So this this doctorate has been a nice moment for me, to like, grow my own musical voice

[Aaron] Of course, and on your musical voice, this is always a question that I am careful with with composers because there's always that danger of always comparing people's music to other people's music and never identifying it uniquely, and so I ask this generously, is how would you describe your music whether that's to a style, a composer, composers or just general vibe of it. How would you describe your music?

[Nico] I mean, I think as composers we are all, we are all greatly influenced by the things that we hear for sure, and I grew up in a very musical family. My father's an orchestra conductor. So I grew up very much just listening to orchestral repertoire, so, and it's specifically Latin American orchestral repertoire. So I have a lot of influences from, like, I listen to a lot of Gina Stera Revueltas and their musical styles. Speak to me, but I think I've also heavily influenced by I listen to a lot of pop music, like a lot. So, and film music which is why I went into film for a while, so I don't, I don't know. I'd like to think that my musical style is, it's very melodically driven. I'll say that, and I try to keep the melody very clear no matter what is going on texturally,  kind of in the background because personally, when I listen to pieces of music I really enjoy being able to follow a melodic line and see how it's transformed throughout. So I think I I just kind of do that. Naturally, I think I try to keep the melodic line very clear. And try to find just a whole bunch of ways to transform it or state it, especially in an orchestral setting with fun orchestration.

[Aaron] Yeah, I think that's certainly spoken to in the piece that we'll be discussing today, and on the topic of orchestral Latin music or Latin influence. What are some composers for people to check out because, I, as a violin or raised as a violinist, I'm pretty well versed in orchestral canon, but what are some composers that you can point to for people for that sub-genre, genre?

[Nico] Yeah, well definitely Gina Stera Revueltas. I mean, like I said, has a great influence on my music. Silvestre Revueltas, Mexican composer. I don't love how a lot of people call him the Stravinsky of Latin America. Like he has his own voice, and you know, it's around the same time period but he, there's always that comparison, right.

[Aaron] The Stravinsky of Latin America.

[Nico] There's always this euro centric comparison to everything, and I feel like, you know, Latin American music has for the longest time just been, has always been there but has never been raised to quite the same platform or pedestal that European composers have. So definitely check out Revueltas. Villa Lobos, fantastic, um, Moncayo, and like even modern Latin American composers are doing really good stuff like Jimmy Lopez. Gavriela Lina Frank, Gavriela Ortiz, just to name name a couple definitely check them out. 

[Aaron] Of course, And I'll try to include as many relevant links in the description of the episode for people to look at their music. And certainly euro centrism. I mean, I think a prime example of that is even myself. Because I I would label myself as relatively open to outside of the European canon, but I didn't know a single name of those composers that you just listed.

[Nico] Yeah, because they're not really talked about.

[Aaron] Yeah, and it's funny you say the Stravinsky of Latin America because as you saw in the notes I compare something later in your piece to something that Stravinsky would do and now I feel kind of guilty.

[Nico] It's, don't feel guilty. It's like it's all it's all we're taught right in school. It's really all that we know and we wouldn't have, like, I don't have a lot of knowledge for music from like East Asia for example composers going on over there because like, it's just either not taught in schools. I haven't been exposed to a lot of it. But you know we now live in an age where like it's great, we should all love to learn about these different styles and new composers that we just we just weren't exposed to.

[Aaron] We should be excited and I think many people many people are thank you for sharing that now I have to ask because I also mostly listen to pop music. What are some of your favorite artists right now?

[Nico] Oh, uh favorite artists right now.

[Aaron] Or just all time, either-or.

[Nico] Oh, no, that one's harder. I can't, I mean I grew I will say my queen is Shakira. Mainly because like that was the first album one heard don't understand his leather on his album was like the first my very first cd and I listened to it like on loop.

[Aaron] Oh my gosh. That makes me so happy. I love Shakira. My mom and I in our midwestern home in rural Michigan would be dancing to Shakira cds.

[Nico] I love that.

[Aaron] Oh, I love Shakira so much.

[Nico] I love Shakira. I've been listening to a lot of um, Caroline Palachek. Recently, I love her stuff. Um, I don't know. I feel like I have a lot of my pop girlies. Rosalia, I love Rosalia. Like I think she's just her whole concept albums just style, but I I love it all so yeah, just to name a couple.

[Aaron] I mean mine is maybe a little bit more basic but my queen forever will be Lady Gaga.

[Nico] Great choice.

[Aaron] Yeah, it's just after I saw as a star is born. I mean before that too, but I love all of it. I know she's like up there with some of the most talked about people. But anyways, all right, Shakira. I love that. All right. I lost track of where we are in the interview. Okay. As you mentioned you're just finishing up your time here at Florida State University in the DMA and composition program so that's a huge moment, um, in any person's life, in any field but I would say markedly in our shared fields, especially. How do you feel?

[Nico] You know, everyone's been asking me that and um I'm I think I'm still processing just because it's been it has truly felt like a mad dash of just like finish this piece and get this out there. You've got rehearsal this week or whatever and I don't know. I defended I walked back into the room after they talked about my piece later. They said congratulations, Dr. Gutierrez and I don't know. I I came home that day and I didn't know what to do. Like I felt happy but, maybe it was just like I was so used to constantly being working on stuff that I just I laid down and I thought wow now what you know, yeah.

[Aaron] Yeah, so I've heard stories that some people like get existential at those moments.

[Nico] Yeah, I felt I felt that just because I mean like it's an ending to a chapter and the the beginning of whatever is next, you know, whatever that is. I don't know yet. Um still figuring that one out. But we all are still figuring stuff out. But it is a moment because you do recognize that like for me I have spent the past three years, you know, working towards this degree doing coursework teaching, writing, and it gives you a moment to kind of reflect back on everything that you did. You know just kind of say, wow I did all that, like and now I get to be called doctor! I get to click the like on any drop down menu. I now get to click doctor on the title. I think that that's my favorite part. I have a title.

[Aaron] That is pretty cool. Well, you've certainly you've certainly earned it. Did you do your masters here at Florida State?

[Nico] No, I did my masters at Columbia College, Chicago.

[Aaron] Oh, okay.

[Nico] And my master's was in music, what was it called, music composition for the screen in in writing for a film and video games, essentially?

[Aaron] So speaking of your dissertation and all of that, which it's quite an honor, Uh, to not only be talking to you, but I've heard so much about you from the other composition students.

[Nico] Oh stop.

[Aaron] No, really I have. um, and it's particularly an honor I think to feature your dissertation. That's something really unique I think, at least in my mind, because it's such a crowning achievement of yours. And so, Teogonia?

[Nico] Mm-hmm Teogonia. You got it. You got it. It's fine.

[Aaron] I wrote out a phonetic spelling. I'm, anyway, now to give background to the listeners. I first heard this piece a little bit ago where we had a visiting professor here at Florida State University. Dr. Scott Lee from the University of Florida where I did my bachelor's there and at the time I was maybe one of two music theory undergrads, uh in a pretty heavy composition place. So I had actually quite a lot of composition classes and I had quite a few with Dr. Lee so I wanted to go to the master class to see him again. That was a cool experience. But you were presenting the piece at the master class and so I got to hear it there and I was very much starstruck, I I mean like I said, if I were to describe myself as a performer, like an orchestral classically trained violinist. I guess those are the qualifiers I would put on that, and so I have a lot of experience and respect for the, the history of the orchestra. And I just, that is legitimately one of the best orchestral pieces I have heard and seen in a long time and I'm purposely not saying new music orchestra, because it's kind of a loaded qualifier in my mind because...

[Nico] Yeah, it has it has baggage.

[Aaron] It does, because there are some Beethoven symphonies that I would say, the man did not know how to write for strings. But that, that's just me, or a very poor orchestration in some places. I hope I don't get canceled for saying that. But my point being is, this is not just pure flattery for the point of it. This is one of my favorite orchestral pieces that I've heard in a very long time, and so I thought, even though I was, because, Will and Justine who were on a couple weeks ago kept telling me oh, you need to talk to Nico. You need to talk to Nico. I was like, oh he's getting his doctorate. He's too busy, but after I saw that piece I was like, oh I need to get you on.

[Nico] Thank you. No, that's that's very sweet.

[Aaron] Um, so the name of the piece...

[Nico] Yes. 

[Aaron] Can you describe what it means, and then extensively ,the story of the piece because you had a really cool backstory to it.

[Nico] Yeah, so I mean like maybe this is my maybe this is my training in writing for music to accompany a visual medium, but I find that I write a lot of my pieces based on a story, whether it be visual or or some sort of in this case. It's it's mythology. So Teogonia means theogony, which, I didn't know what that word meant in either Spanish or English. So, a theogony is basically an account of the the origin and descent of gods. So, it's like the the original like creation story, and the gods involved in a creation story so this uh, this piece is based on a mural that's in Colombia. Um, it's at it's at a hotel in Bogota, and the mural is called Teogonia de los dioses chippcha, which means theogony of the chippcha gods, and the chippcha people were the indigenous people of the Bogota sort of region in Colombia, and it's this beautiful mural that, definitely, if you're listening like, look it up. It's gorgeous and I first saw it and thought, oh, this could be a piece because there's clearly a story happening here and this piece focuses on just five of the gods that are depicted in that mural and it's talking, it's the creation story. Which actually has a lot of parallels to, not just the Christian creation story, but just like a lot of creation stories in general have very similar events so the piece is written like in, in five parts, essentially talking about these five gods. Some of them longer than others, but it's very much like in the beginning. There was nothing, then there's this spark of creation and then I talk about the sun god, the moon goddess, um, the god of thunder and rain, and then finally the messenger god at the end. After the great flood and like everything is, we will now move forward from the flood to, to a better world. So that's the background on the on the piece.

[Aaron] I love that for many reasons one. I have a big interest in theology myself, I've always found the whole study very fascinating and the culture, what you can learn from culture, from that, and I also have to I want to ask... What is your process for adapting a purely physical or visual medium into a sound landscape? Other or do you are you just going off of the perceptions that you personally have? Do you write a story clear as you just said you created a a formal plan, from what you perceived, because the more that I involved myself in avant-garde, I'm not labeling this necessarily a typical avant-garde, but newer music and approaches to interpretation. I find it interesting how different people approach adapting something that has nothing to do with the aural senses necessarily. So how do you go about that?

[Nico] I think it's just, I, I spend a lot of time looking at the, in this case, the the mural I spent a lot of time looking at the artwork. I was reading some, there are a couple of right writings on the mural, I was reading those just to also learn about the the creation story. I wasn't familiar, but I guess I just start by coming up with themes for these characters essentially and from then I just, I keep I always keep the story in mind. Like what's happening at this moment? How do I score that essentially, and, yeah, whatever comes out just kind of comes out and I just, I try to, I try to kind of roll with whatever comes out this this piece in particular was hard to start. I think I restarted like, I don't know, seven or eight times. It was, it was, it was rough. 

[Aaron] You know, I think this really speaks to your experience training and interest being a film composer, or for a visual medium as well because you're creating themes settings vibes, to put it casually, about an entire person or in this case, like an idea of a person. And so I think that's really fascinating the application of something that you would see in a movie into, just a visual art, that is like, star wars or something like that. Yeah, I don't want to call it leitmotif, but I guess it's mildly like that. I guess not really...

[Nico] You can you can mildly call it that, I just, I tried to, like you said it's trying to capture something from another art form but that's also based on like oral tradition. So in the end though, we have to latch onto something we, we like there's so much that is, that it, could be represented but, but in the end we need to have something to latch onto that we can recognize. And you can hear that in this piece the one of the very first themes that appears in it, first appears in the contra bassoon. That's what I'm calling Chiminigagua's theme. Chiminigagua is the, like, the all-powerful creator god of the Chipchas and, even though the rest of the piece is about the, the rest of the creation story and the other gods, that theme reappears as, like, the theme that ties everything back together. As this, this one unifying theme and you'll see it like transformed and mixed in with the themes of the other gods.

[Aaron] I love that. Oh because, you know, I'm you, you're telling me all that. I'm recontextualizing my own observations, I love that.

[Nico] No, I did it on accident, but I actually sent you the score without any notes. I'm noticing now.

[Aaron] Yes, I took it as a challenge.

[Nico] No, so this is great. Uh, and like, when we were following up, I was like, oh, you know what? This might be interesting just to see what, what he thinks of it without any information.

[Aaron] Yeah, to break down how I perceived it, to jump forward a little bit because I want to talk about the process of writing for orchestra, to jump forward a little bit. I perceived it as a large ABA' form, which, I feel stupid now. You said that there's five distinct themes and also I did know, I didn't detect each thing as a character already, each idea, as a character because, like you just said, they reappear in different ways. So I saw that as, maybe not typical, but the more standard way of economy of means of different themes throughout a piece of work in different instruments. Which is, I guess on the surface still what you did. But, I love the rationalization that the rationalization, that the creation theme is always there, that is so, I think, that is more impactful in detailing that in analysis than anything about ABA or whatever the.....

[Nico] As far as the, like, structure goes it's not, I mean, there's definitely like if you were to draw out, um, like an energy sort of map like there's, there's definitely like two sort of big, big sort of book end sections and in the middle. We've got this like a slower section, so I can definitely see the whole ABA thing for sure.

[Aaron] But I will say when I got the score, and there were no notes, I thought well, maybe he just doesn't, maybe he just doesn't want to share them. I don't know. So I just went for it.

[Nico] No, I fully forgot. I sent you just the score.

[Aaron] Well, this is interesting then, this is interesting. Before we get on to more technicalities. What was it like, why did you decide on full orchestra, and full orchestra with a big capital F and O, because you had, you had harp and a fully fleshed out percussion section and then a plenty of multi-line devici in the strings as well. So you didn't just do like, an orchestra from, I don't know, 1700 or whatever. But, what was that process like, and also why did you decide on that? I know a dissertation, the expectation is a large piece, but what brought you to this decision?

[Nico] Mainly the fact that I, in my catalogue at this moment, I don't have just a standalone orchestral piece of this length is mainly the thing that drove this. I have a lot of shorter cues that are big and orchestral, but they're may be two, three minutes long or something like that. And any larger works that I have, like, in length, they are choral orchestral. So there's a lot of, you know, that's so I'm featuring more the choir and the vocalists, 
and I saw this as a unique opportunity for me to finally like focus on just instruments focus on like: How I can create a piece using the different voices and colors of just an orchestra? So that was one of the the main reasons driving it.

[Aaron] And I also have to ask additionally, what is it like, mentally, to work on a singular piece for so long of such size, of such size and, I would assume, personal importance, but also clearly academic as well.

[Nico] To be completely honest with you. I wrote this piece in a month.

[Aaron] How? How did you write that in a month?

[Nico] I, well, I have a lot of trading for like writing quickly from, like, my film days, but I truly, like, I should have been working on this the entire year, but I had two or three big commissions that I had to get out of the way first. And they were like, they were big. One of them was like a 15 minute choral piece that got performed down with the the master chorale of Tampa Bay and the other one was, like, full orchestra and choir piece for the Tallahassee community chorus here and those those took up my fall semester. So, yeah, I was like, Spring came along and uh, I was like, okay. I gotta write this now.

[Aaron] I'm sorry if there are any young people listening, but I don't understand how the [censored] you wrote a doctoral dissertation in a month, of this magnitude, and I would say, abject quality.

[Nico] There was a lot of all-nighters, there were, there was a lot of panicking. But you know what, I do work best under pressure, I have found, because it forces you to commit through your ideas. You don't have the luxury of second-guessing yourself.

[Aaron] I don't know if you've seen the meme going around really recently, but it's like, 11:59pm discussion post due and it's 11:50pm and it's a guy saying "pressure makes diamonds".

[Nico] Yeah, it truly does, I, yeah. I mean, I don't like to think that I, I mean, I guess we all procrastinate to a certain extent. I don't think a lot of this was procrastination, I really was busy, but when I did finally get to the point where I was like, all right, I need to start this, I was a little burnt out. So I will say there was maybe a couple weeks in January where I was sketching and taking a breath from the previous semester, but February hit and I took like two or three initial ideas to my composition lessons, and my composition professor, we were both like, uh, this isn't really going anywhere. So that's when the panic started because he told me, he like essentially wanted a finished draft by like beginning of march, essentially. So I had a month.

[Aaron] Oh my gosh, that is terrifying. No wonder you kept restarting the beginning, as you said.

[Nico] Yeah, oh my gosh. Yeah, it was, I don't know. I just had different ideas but, I'm really happy with how this one turned out, especially the opening just because I got to play, I really played with the orchestration in that one just because it's it starts in this primordial ooze sort of state, because nothing has been created, right. So, that was fun to because I feel like I said earlier. I really like to focus on melody, and while that theme does appear, it was really fun to make like weird sounds with the orchestra. I got a lot of the glissandi. Um, yeah, that that was just really fun and incorporating a lot of Latin American percussion. That to me was really important to have in the piece and I draw a lot of inspiration from, there's a piece by Revuelta, is called, "La noche de los mayas", which is based on a film actually, but it does incorporate like Latin American percussion. It's huge like I think it it calls for like 12 percussionists Uh, so it doesn't get performed that often

[Aaron] Yeah, well that you know, that's a great segway into, I want to talk about, I picked two umbrella ideas to talk about, which is tonal direction and then orchestration, and one big element of the orchestration, as you just pointed out, it's undeniable and one of the coolest features of the piece is the prominence of the percussion choir and that family of instruments. And you said you incorporated some Latin instruments into it what I found relieving and interesting about. Sometimes, with, percussion centric pieces, in my opinion, I'm not a percussionist. So, you know, maybe people think this about strings as well. Sometimes, when there's a large percussion ensemble it can get kind of droning if you put so much focus on them. Uh, that's just, I'm not pointing to any examples. That's just a slight observation, but I found it fascinating how you juggled both the players the timbres, and at any given moment in the piece, par let's say maybe some of the slower moments, there's always a focus on percussion. So, what was it like dancing between the different instruments the timbres and leaving enough room in the texture for them to speak?

[Nico] Oh, that's a good question. Um, I don't know. I I always approach, I usually approach percussion as like actually one of the last things that I do but in this piece It really needed to they had to have their own sort of presence and independence um, and percussion is just such a great family of instruments to just like add little details add the shine to the orchestra that like I don't I don't know little touches here and there like like in the slow section that that you mentioned. And so that that one's um about Chia the the Moon Goddess, and the Moon Goddess and the Sun God they're married. And so um, this was, I was describing the goddess, but it was also their love theme, their their romance, because they have a they can only be together during an eclipse. And so I essentially like describe them coming together and the percussion there um, I have these aleatoric lines, um with the cartelis in the triangle just to give that little shine that I was talking about that etherealness. Uh, because we we had just come out of this very I'll describe it as like earthly section because we were, It was essentially a dance um is how I wanted to describe the Sun God just energy and I focused on a lot of Colombian rhythms there like like the bambuco um, so that I definitely used the percussion in a different way there that I was trying to highlight the the traditional dance rhythm. Whereas in this slower section with the with the romance I wanted the percussion more to be just atmospheric. Just to give us a new setting. 

[Aaron] Okay. So because I love that section so much we're going to skip over the first more earthly section We're going to come back to talking about that. But the the marriage of the Moon Goddess and we said the Sun God, that is my favorite section of the piece, uh part of it.

[Nico] I really like that part too

[Aaron] That that that it shows my bias as a string player. But I feel like we are showering you with comments, but it it or compliments all the time. But really your string writing in this section. Which is the section that you were just describing where it has an ethereal aleatoric percussion element. And alongside thick dynamic layered approach, but it's still melodically driven in every instrument. So, So, So, And you have a string writing that would make Bruckner need to re re-examine his orchestration book.

[Nico] My oh my gosh um. 

[Aaron] It's just this is also so dramatic, but I look when I when I experience media, i'm a crier. I cry during movies. Every Toy Story I've cried at some point. Um, you know like yeah, it's just I get very emotional with art and during the reading during the uh, master class I did start to tear up a little bit during the Moon Goddess and Sun God marriage. And and then that is just such an enlightening moment and just the way it builds and then evaporates at the climax of the of the moment. Can you talk, I I don't really have a specific question. Can you just talk about that moment some more?

{Nico] Yeah, I, well, I will say like at my truest core. I am a romantic. Um, and I in in my personal life this this past year I've been through a lot in my, I I was I got out of like an eight-year relationship and uh, I just I went through a lot of emotional stress that I hadn't been in a while, I guess And I just I guess I tapped into that in this section. Um and it just it came together just kind of naturally because I I knew I wanted some sort of climactic moment for like the eclipse, essentially when the two can finally be together. But it was it was working out really nicely. Um, I was trying to juggle a bunch of the the themes that I had stated previously or had just stated in this section and, without intending to, they fit together very nicely and I just kind of noticed that happening. And so when I started playing around and putting all of it together it just it made for a very satisfying build to the climax. And the climax was actually going to be this big moment um, like orchestrally I was going to have like a lot more instruments come in but it was actually my composition professor that um suggested hey you have such nice uh a nice build in the strings and it's focused on the string so much. Why not have this moment like right at the climactic like chord essentially? Have everyone else cut out and just have high strings because they're all very high in the tessitura. And it, I tried it out, and I really liked the sound So that's why, I mean, you'll hear like building up to it. I bring back in harp, percussion, horns, come in winds come in and then we finally build build build to a very exposed uh moment essentially it does kind of all disappear and it just it really worked out. I I I am very very proud of that section so it makes me happy to hear that someone else uh connected with it. 

[Aaron] I did um mentally and apparently emotionally as well. Uh, it's a brilliant section. So going back to what I Clumsily labeled the first major a section but the more earthly idea that you were talking about. You made an interesting comment before we started recording that you don't typically consider theory very heavily when you're composing and that made me even more excited for what I was going to say because it feels as though in the earthly section is the first major energetic section and then the second is you are tonal adjacent. Adjacent in that you never fully commit to the grounded tonal structure, but always have tonal areas in a given place. And one of the places I want to highlight, I did a little bit of analysis and it just shows the amount of precise nuance when it comes to these sort of things and it makes me even more excited that you weren't looking at this in a theoretical technical way. So for the listeners, this is a moment in the earthly section that we were talking where one of the first most prominent themes that it just punches through the texture. There's other themes But this is probably the most obvious one that is in the lower voices and is centered around D. It's a quasi modal maybe pentatonic.

[Nico] It's actually the the creation theme but it's more energetic now. 

[Aaron] Oh dang it. I feel like a bad theorist. I missed that. Dang it. I have to say that that earthly theme in the uh, shoot. I missed that, I missed that, I missed that. That theme has been stuck in my head so much. It gets interjected by the high woodwinds and the high woodwinds have a different centricity of tonality than that theme. That theme is centered for the most part around D. These woodwinds are not centered around D and they are initiated with a strong downbeat and repetition and they are not centered around D And they are initiated with a strong downbeat and repetition of an E flat. And how you introduce them is that you finish that initial theme on a D in the measure before and leading up to the downbeat that the woodwinds have with an E flat, the woodwinds have octuplets, you know, they have octuplets of going up stepwise to that downbeat. And you initiate the octuplet with a D natural. I think it's pretty obvious to everyone you're leading from a centricity on D to a centricity on E flat, makes sense, but to sustain this not strictly tonal land in that octuplet run before completing the octave you put a D flat, that just a just a little little touch. That removes it from this strictly western tonal leading tone. And I just think little details like that is what makes the magic happen. And I don't understand how I focused on one note in an octuplet run, but I miss the fact that one of your main themes Is connected to one of the first melodic ideas at the beginning. 

[Nico] Well, I well, no, I didn't notice that actually the the D flat, you know and and that at all, but I I mean to speak to that. Like I said, I don't I really do, I'm not informed by by or i'm not thinking about music theory when I'm writing but well, but It's like what is what is music theory? What what are we calling it? But I think it was just a lot of it was instinct and when I got into what the tonal like language was of this piece, which was I mean it was very much based on the pentatonic scales. A lot of early music from several cultures actually use the the pentatonic scale. I do think that perhaps in the back of my mind um that the whole step, the the the relationship of the whole step going like te do which I use a lot actually and like at the end of the piece. It's in the creation theme I I guess I just I wanted more of that, or that felt integral to like the overall sound So maybe maybe that's why the D-flat is in there or or yeah to to get us to the E-flat because we have that whole step relationship. But again, I'm not thinking that way. It's just kind of it happens

[Aaron] It almost feels silly that I bring up such a little concept when it makes more sense the way that you're thinking about it, to the evocation of certain ideas because you're also interpreting another art form, so it makes sense to be evoking those things. Before we move on, is there anything else you want to say specific to Teogonía is there anything else specific that you want to say to that or the compositional process of orchestra?

[Nico] Well, there's it depends on, I've met composers that when they write for the orchestra, they start with like piano score or or something and then orchestrate from there. Um, there are some composers that just kind of dive in. My process is more the the dive in sort of version. That's, it's how I approach the orchestra. Um, but I write I write everything in Logic actually. I don't, notation is the last thing that I do.

[Aaron] That's fascinating.

[Nico] Yeah, I don't I don't think in terms of like these are the note durations or whatever. I I play each part in, based I play through all the different instruments into the DA. Again, my media training that's that's how everyone kind of writes over there. 

[Aaron] I was about to say you really are a film composer or a media composer.

[Nico] Yeah, it's well because I I was trained in both like in, during my undergrad I wrote everything in Finale. I wrote everything I started pencil paper and then put everything into finale and then I didn't hear anything until the the live performance, because I had really bad midi. And then when I did my masters, I was kind of thrown to the wolves. I didn't know that this was how a lot of composers write, or it's just a different way to write. And something clicked for me there because all of a sudden I was free from notation, which for me I found was very limiting because I was so focused on like what is this rhythm or is it fitting the meter? Do I have to change the meter here? I wasn't thinking of any of that now. There was a moment where I could just freely play and whatever came out I would figure out how to put it on on paper later. But it was such a freeing experience that I I fully write everything that way now because it's just it's a lot easier to me. It's faster, especially when I'm like like in the zone and I'm trying to figure things out I no longer have to pause and say, okay, how do I notate this? It really takes you out of the flow, it really takes you out of the flow. So that's that's how I wrote this piece and all of my other pieces, and so like just playing in on my midi keyboard pretending to be the different members of the orchestra. That's that's how I wrote this piece and how I approach orchestral writing.

[Aaron] To me that would almost seem more intimidating. I guess I'm so comfortable with the shackles of notation, I guess you could say, it's just it's most of what I know. I mean I had an electric acoustic class. So I learned how to use Logic, Ableton um in those different DAWs, but fascinating. 

[Nico] It's just, it's I found I found it so freeing because I, no longer did I have to I mean yes, we can analyze pieces based on like what's on the score but we were analyzing cues and and film scores and um, you know some of those we didn't have access to the score because they they're delivered in an audio format. Same thing honestly with our cast orchestra too. It's a performance right, like we're receiving it through our ears, not our eyes um for the most part. I mean, it's performance stuff that can do with that, but it taught me to analyze using my ears not my eyes and so it's more of an aural experience and it's a playground there. And so you you're using more what sounds good together as opposed to when I when I write using ,when I wrote using notation, I would be thinking what sounds good but, there was that visual reinforcement that I'd be like, oh, of course, this would sound good because I can see the hairpins and this is like dovetailing into this. It almost felt like uh to me now it feels like crutches. Um, whereas as opposed to just fully thinking what's gonna sound good? And i'll just play it.

[Aaron] So I I find that fascinating. Because then, now I'm going to we go into our final little segment of this I ask you, you've already spoken a bit um, and I previewed a bit on your thoughts of music theory and your own application of it, but your love of moving away from that restrictive mode of notation also speaks to wanting to move away from so much of a purely technical way of looking at the music. As you said you can always go back and analyze and see what works and doesn't work post-mortem. But what are your thoughts on the world of music theory academia and so on? You have your doctorate now, so burn a bridge or two if you want.

[Nico] I I think we could um it's hard because uh, I think a lot. It is important. I think in a pedagogical sense for sure, just giving us basic understandings of how harmony works or how what what are how what are different ways we can talk about music? You know, I think that's at the core of music theory. And I fully respect that. But I do think we get caught up in the insistence on on part writing, or I don't know stuff that it was is foundational I think in in the the education of the musician. But when I when I got here to start my doctorate it had been probably eight years or something or nine years from the last time that I had to do part writing You know? 

[Aaron] Wow Really? Oh my gosh. 

[Nico] The last time that I did part writing was my undergraduate. Um, and that was it. It was, you know, for the classroom. I understood how that style of harmony worked but, I don't know I think we're we're in an age where, we have been, in an age where anything goes for a while a long time actually. So but you know, that's looking at music theory from this narrow stereotypical perspective of like oh we're studying Bach chorales and that's music theory. When like no there's there's many other aspects to music theory. I just personally don't think in that sort of formula equate like even even set theory or like picking set classes, I think those are great tools to generate ideas and obviously there are very important works that are written using different techniques like those. And I I think they're all great tools and they're all fascinating. I just I don't write that way. I would, I'm going to go out on the limb here and say most modern composers don't, they all use the tools in different ways and to a different level and so on so forth but I get a sense that most don't, and that's perfectly fine.

[Aaron] Now I have to ask, so there's music theory, now that you are well, you sounds like you have been for quite a while, but fully in the professional world now fully fully yeah, what are your thoughts on composition? The world of composition, where we are, where we've been, where we should be going. Are we doing all right? What's going on?

[Nico] I think this gets into, this gets into academia also because I feel like the world of composition can be very academic. It has been for a while.

[Aaron] And what do you see that as a good thing or a bad thing or a neutral thing? 

[Nico] Um, neutral, I guess but for But but I think there's a lot to educate on. At least my my time in like the film industry and music for media opens my eyes to an entire world that is not discussed a lot in the classroom. Because I don't know there there's something about like people even use the term. Oh, it sounds like film music or there's something filmy about that sound like what does that mean? Do you know? I'm guilty of saying that about other pieces I'm guilty like I I understand the um, I understand where the similar sounds where that can come from. Like let's say we're there's a composer working on a tv, especially tv is so quick that it's like sometimes you just need some moody chords here and there and like maybe that that that's why we have this this word filmy, or I don't know. But there's something about music for media and pop music that for the longest time just has been looked as lesser than to the academic world. And I don't know as far as like the state of composition I feel like composers today there's a lot more bridging that gap, which I appreciate but I still see a great sort of remnant of this divide between like what is what is popular or commercial music and what is serious academic music? Whatever that means. So I just I just I I wish that we would, especially in the music theory classroom, do more of the stuff that I I'm not sure what that means. Do more of the stuff that I um, I experienced in my master's which was like let's analyze a piece. Let's analyze a piece just based on its production like what what reverbs and effects do we have? Like and how does that contribute to the overall sound? Because that that is orchestration in a sense for a pop song, you know, why is why is this word why does that one have like an extra long delay and none of the other words do you know, that's a choice.

[Aaron] I agree with you phenomenally, and there's a a mirrored issue in music theory as well, as you just said in the music theory classroom about serious and non-serious music. I hate those terms. It's so loaded. And like it's being addressed, like this isn't new. This has been, there are so many theorists and educators out there that are talking about this, but it's gonna take a long time to like fully get away from this this. The there's there's just a disconnect I think between the the two worlds. Yeah, it's yeah Like you said, it's not like it isn't being talked about or addressed and I would fair to say almost everyone's aware of it, but there still is you know. I would say I generally focus on pop music in my own analysis in my interests and it's very much like oh, that's so cute and cool that you're doing that. Anyway, so let's look at Schubert.

[Nico] Right and like, you know What does that mean? It's like because how do you analyze a pop song? You don't have the sheet music, you're listening to the audio and the production. So maybe it's just that there's a safety net in like looking at sheet music because it's what we've been trained to do for so long that oh, okay. This is this makes more sense because i'm more familiar with it or like I have I'm using more than one sense here to analyze the piece of music

[Aaron] Yeah, I I illustrated that myself. I said I find the idea of writing completely in a DA scary because I I just find so much comfort in notation. So right there even.

[Nico] Yeah, I mean I was I was freaking out my first my first semester at that school. Yeah, I was I did not know what was going on, but you know spend some time sit in the discomfort and you can discover some really cool things about yourself and just music in general. Like it really opens your mind to, I'll just go back to pop music and how like a lot of the stereotype is like, oh, it's just four chords over and over you know or whatever and like no, there's there's so much more happening in there that you're you're hearing but maybe you're not quite listening to all the details that are happening in the production. 

[Aaron] Completely agree, completely agree. So Nico, Dr. Gutierrez. What's next for you? What's next for you? 

[Nico] I don't know I'll just I'm just gonna keep writing. I've been applying for positions and stuff but um, you know if I it's very competitive out there. So I either way, I'm gonna be focusing on my writing. I think I'm gonna focus a little more on chamber music just because I don't have a lot of chamber pieces I'm realizing now so realizing now so and yeah. I think I'm gonna step into a little more film work also as well. That's that's the current plan. 

[Aaron] Well, like I said, we're just we're just figuring things out as we go. That's okay. Your graduation is next week and by the time this episode goes live you'll have been fully hooded. So I mean I, you you can take a breath, you can take a breath. But, so what would be the best way, of course your contact information will be on the contributor page on the host website and available in the episode description, but what would be the best way for people to contact you for any questions, inquiries, comments?

[Nico] So, uh, you can feel free to visit my website. I have a little section there where you can message me on there. Um, you can also just I reply a lot on Instagram. So you can just DM me and all we can get to chatting there. Um, I'm I'm happy to talk music or or whatever. Yeah.

[Aaron] And if you could give a final message to the audience music theory, composition, music itself, whatever you want to say, what would that be?

[Nico] I would say, just based on this conversation, will everybody please go and just spend some time like, the, doing the term by Pauline Oliveras, which is called deep listening. Just sit with a pop song, like in my song writing class, I usually play In To You by Ariana Grande or Blank Space by Taylor Swift, two songs that were really played like a lot on the radio and we've heard them a lot. But have you ever listened to them, in like, really, really good speakers or really deep headphones and just listen to the first couple of seconds on loop and try and see like what you can find in there. There's so much happening. That get just gets washed over because we're listening to it in the car and, you know, there's road noise or it's just like or we're like, oh this song again like, next, you know. So, spend some time deep listening everyone.

[Aaron] That recommendation makes me so happy. I second that, I second that. All right. Well, thank you, Dr. Nico Gutierrez, for being for being on the Theorist Composer Collaboration and showing with us your doctoral dissertation piece, Teogonia. Phenomenal piece of work. I wish you luck out there and thank you again for spending time.

[Nico] Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

[Aaron] Hello, this is Aaron again, I want to thank you for listening to this episode of the theorist composer collaboration another big thank you to Dr. Nico Gutierrez for joining the program alongside his composition Teogonia.  In the description of this episode, regardless of the platform you are on, there will be links to Dr Gutierrez's website, email and social media and I would appreciate it if you could show him some support. His information will also be readily compiled on the corresponding contributor page on our host website as well. In reflection, It was quite the honor to interview Nico, or Dr. Gutierrez, on the piece for his doctoral dissertation I still cannot get over the fact that he composed the piece roughly within a month. Although it was mildly stressful in the lead-up and preparation for the interview, it was actually quite the unique experience to not have access to any program notes. Even if by mistake, honestly, it was pretty fun to see how my experience analyzing the piece mixed with the actual elements of the music that were intentional without being aware of what they were ahead of time, even if I missed the mark on some of my takes. Thank you again so much to Dr. Nico Gutierrez for coming on to the program and for sharing his piece Teogonia. For further updates and notifications on the Theorist Composer Collaboration. Make sure to subscribe to our email listing on the home page of our host website, and follow our Instagram and Facebook pages, relevant links are in the description. You can also listen to future episodes through our host website, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and YouTube. So make sure you subscribe to the platform of your choosing, again, all relevant links are in the description. TCC episodes are posted weekly on Mondays, and don't miss our weekly blog posts, which go live a few days after a new episode is added. I am also very excited to promote our next featured composer Dr. Michael Kahle with his piece titled: We are the stories we've been told. A dynamic three movement work for flute, viola and vibraphone. You won't want to miss it. But until then, this is Aaron, and thank you for joining the TCC.